Hip Hop Dock-trine

First a matter of business. When Aaron McGruder introduced “The Boondocks” in 1999 it had one of the most syndicated launches in comic history. A few years later and your best bet at getting to check in on Huey and Riley was at Okayplayer.com. Fast forward 2005 and McGruder kills again when “The Boondocks” cartoon scores the largest premier in Adult Swim history. Since then we haven’t heard much, and rumors of a similar disappearance loomed over the cartoon. Ha, no worries, 15 more episodes this June. Word. Moving on.



I can’t tell you how many times I have been watching “The Boondocks” with buddies and someone asks “who is this?” when the theme music roles - and I’m like “motherfucker, don’t you have Google?” But don’t sweat it: It’s Asheru, who’s the host of Dub Floyd’s Hip Hop Docktrine: The Official Boondocks Mixtape – a collection of previously released tracks from well known artists and some Boondocks original content.



Blended thoughtfully, Dub Floyd uses relevant samples from the show to blend with thematic elements of songs. A clip of Grandpa giving Riley an asswhooping leads into Ghostface’s “Whip You With A Strap” and a clip of Huey listing the “radical leftist organizations” he founded segues into an ill remix of “Black Panthers” with Dead Prez, Common, and the Last Poets.



Dub Floyd stays on point, linking the content of the show to his tracklisting. The songs mix humor, hip hop, reverence, cartoon culture, and social commentary just like McGruder does to the strip and show. Songs like Akir’s “Politricks,” Edo G’s “Wishing,” and the Roots “It Don’t Feel Right” bang unabashed social criticism. Other songs are lighter but stick to the message like Dangerdoom’s “Old School” where Talib raps “I might be buggin but it seem to me that cartoons seem realer than reality TV.”



But don’t overlook the fresh talent on the tape. The host Asheru, best known for the theme, does some heavy lifting on tracks with Talib and Black Lincolns. “We break bread as if we have pockets with no bottoms/cant be further from the truth/like words spit in the booth/mixed down packaged and shipped/then marketed to the youth” he spits on “Revolution.” The dude Tough Junkie also gets real creative on “Boondocks Freestyle” – a track parodying black kids moving into the white suburb over a beat crafted from the Boondocks interlude with Uncle Ruckus getting buck on the hook.



While most of these tracks are well known bangers, this is truly the soundtrack to McGruder’s important contribution. The clips from the show had me laughing my ass off – like when Riley tells Mr. Dubois to “get off [MLK’s] dick. But the album is heady too. My pencil looked nubbish after trying to keep track of how many times the word “revolution” is dropped on the tape. But that’s “The Boondocks,” a wicked blend of humor and smarts that scares a lot of motherfuckers out there.



DOWNLOAD: Dub Floyd x Wally Sparks - Hip Hop Docktrine 2.5 (The Boondocks Best)